Update 8/1/25: Reposting as this has now been sent out via email as well. It appears confirmed that there are two groups of nerfs, one group who can still count their investment account and one group who can not. No one knows what causes someone to be in the ‘good nerf’ or ‘bad nerf’ group.
Update 7/27/25: Some cardholders have received letters that are actually different than what is listed below and actually requires a $100,000 balance in a checking account to earn the 4% (rather than $100,000 in checking, savings and investment). Hat tip to bogleheads
Original post: Earlier this year U.S. Bank made huge changes to the Smartly credit card, but the changes only applied to new applicants and existing cardholders were grand fathered in. Existing cardholders have now received a notice that this is changing, starting on 9/15/25:
- “earn unlimited 2% cash back on every purchase with no caps”
- “earn up to an additional 2% cash back [the “Smartly Earning Bonus”] on your first $10,000 in eligible Net Purchases each billing cycle when paired with a U.S. Bank Smartly Savings account and average daily combined qualifying balances in U.S. Bank deposit, trust or investment accounts” with $100K+ in qualifying balance required for a total of 4% cash back
- exclude* certain categories of purchases “from earning the Smartly Earning Bonus”: (1) “Education/school, gift cards, insurance, or tax”; (2) “Business-to-business transactions (i.e., advertising services, construction material suppliers, etc.)”; and (3) “Transactions using third-party bill payment services.” “These purchases will earn the base 2% cash back and are not calculated as part of the $10,000 billing cycle cap.”
Surprised they didn’t make these changes earlier in the year to be honest, this card was never sustainable.
I would rather get 2% rollover match on $100k investment balance than getting additional 2% cashback for rollover $100k investment balance and spend $100k.
What’s the best way to dissolve the investment account assuming it’s mostly sgov? Transfer assets and pay a fee to close or liquadate, transfer cash out, and then close?
ACATS transfer to Robinhood. They are offering a 0.5% match and will reimburse your outgoing transfer fee.
This is the way. ACATS full transfer.
Let the new brokerage and your feet do all the talking.
So have we determined why some got the bad letter? Maybe not related to USB specifically but to credit report?
Seems like a coin flip to me. I didnt even get to max out 4% this year since my investment dipped in march from the sell off. So my rate was 2%-3% for quite a bit. Ive barely used the card on the excluded items, mainly for every day use.
We got the good version of the letter a few days ago and now the same letter has shown up via email.
Same, along with the USBAR email.
Looks like email is now also happening for many. Came this morning for me as well.
Got the good version of the letter that includes investment accounts.
I had transferred over an IRA back in January with > $300k in assets and also switched to using US Bank as my primary checking and savings accounts, so maybe that has something to do with it. If I needed to put $100k in a checking account to get 4% back, I’d close all those down, so they’d lose assets.
I’ve been using the card mostly normally – only excluded category I’ve taken advantage of has been paying my kids’ school tuition through a third party bill pay service, but nothing that would be manufactured spend or that I’d think of as abusing the system.
If this is how it stays, I’m happy. I don’t spend more than $10k a month, and I don’t do manufactured spend as that feels unethical to me. I don’t mind them making these changes to prevent themselves from losing tons of money. I’ll lose the ability to make a small reward on my kids’ tuition, but if I get to keep my 4% card for everyday spend, I’m happy to make that tradeoff.
+1 to this datapoint, very similar situation here and I got the good nerf
I got the “better” version. Heavy tax payments (about $100k since open). Light school and insurance usage ($x,000).
Transferred a little over $100k to investment. CL used to be $25k, increased to $35k later.
With all the “versions” of the letters going out, it’ll be interesting to see what actually takes place with regard to TOTAL balances being taken into account for purposes of calculating the points escalators.
I had moved some IRA assets to USB to meet the requirements for the V1 release, but will leave the funds there for the moment and see if/when I stop earning the higher multiplier. It should become obvious very fast how people’s experience is going based on the letter we have each received.
Full disclosure; I received the worst of the 3 nerf-notices, but never once did I use the card for tax payments, insurance payments, tuition or any of the other banned categories.
Same here. Never abused. Payed pharmacy, doctors, restaurants and retail.
Got the bad nerf.
What’s the third version? Besides investments and no investments?
You get the heavily nerfed/bad letter if you took advantage using the card heavily on taxes, education, rent, insurance, etc. You get the lightly nerfed/good if you didn’t or only lightly used it on the atypical categories. Nearly all the datapoints I saw support this theory. Investment account size doesn’t matter, how frequently you used the card doesn’t matter, how much you bought using the card doesn’t matter as long as it’s “normal” CC transactions. Underwriters only care about if you “abused” the card.
This was not true for me – I got the “bad letter” and only used it for typical expenses with none from the now-excluded categories. Moderate spend between 1-7k per month.
Did you have $100k+ in an investment account? I wonder if they’re giving the bad letter to someone who will pull out their investments, or people who haven’t taken (full) advantage of the setup. It’s the only thing I haven’t seen data points on.
I expected this to be the case but I got my letter today and got the “light nerfing” despite using almost my entire credit limit on estimated taxes six months in a row
not true for these letters
False. I did 100k tax, 3k tuition, 0 insurance. 100k in brokerage, a few k in savings, no checking account. Got the more favorable letter
Depending on how long you’ve had the card, you don’t seem to understand what “abuse” means.
This is also not true for me. I received the “good” letter even though I spent $30,000 on tax payments and merely $3,000 on everything else.
Letter arrived today. Not nerfed; language INCLUDES “trust or investment accounts”
Holder of Checking/Savings with very minimal use; mostly Fidelity ACH transfers for card payment.
Holder of 100K+ No trade Roth IRA
Smartly Card Member since late 24’
Holder of Altitude Connect Visa for a handful of years.
School payments: No
Tax payments: No
Insurance Payments: Very Minimal
Medical/Dental premiums largest category. CL was low at 2K; very occasional mid-month payments to refresh limit when needed.
did anyone who got fully nerfd call ths probably useless customer service number asking why they got the fully nerfd letter while others that got a different letter for the same account that counts savings and investments. i doubt they know but take a shot to see what they say,
I’m about to but it seems usbank has major system issues now so will do so once they are back up
i was on the phone with cs for almost an hour. switched 4 times. the last a manager did confirm two versions and stated the accounts were reviewed as to which version, called the same, and it was decided through marketing and undrewriting which version of the letter you receive. when i asded her about qualifications to get either, she was actually getting me in touch with underwriting but they wouldnt talk to me, the answer they told her is that they will not discuss underwriting decisions as to how they chose one version over another.
I dont know if what i was told was correct. but the last 2 people i spoke to were very well versed on the changes.
I did get the card along with my checking and invest account at the same time. Had nothing with them when i applied for this card, (whether that meant anything???)
I even asked her id i can apply for the other version , she was told no but they do an account revew every 6 months.
I called. The rep just said “I told know why you got the worst letter, I have no idea what is going o:”
initially they told me a few diffferent things, thought it may have to do with what act i deposited my rewards to. it wasnt until the agent on her own, transferred me to a manager. that manager knew about the different versions and decided to do some more digging which is where she gave me the info about it being a marketing and underwrighting decsion and even said to me. i was told not to discuss any more details with you as how its determined is something they dont have to disclose.